THERE aren't usually many laughs during a classical ballet performance. But Ashley Page's Christmas shows increasingly have them rolling about as well as dancing in the aisles. Without wanting to spoil the best jokes, it is, suffice to say, when heroine Aurora (Claire Robertson) takes delivery of a giant cactus on her 16th birthday that the notion of one little prick changing everything for the young princess takes on new meaning.

Page and designer/right-hand man Antony McDonald are in feisty humour again with this brand-new version of the major Petipa/Tchaikovsky classic Sleeping Beauty for Scottish Ballet. Like The Nutcracker and Cinderella before it, this Beauty fizzes with energy, pops with colour and revels in layers of meaning and references to all from Doctor Who to drug-addled celebs and the greatest Aurora of all time, Margot Fonteyn.

This is Page's third full-length story ballet for Scottish. Like Cinders and Nuts, it thrills in peeling back the saccharine coating of traditional treatments to reveal the dark, thrilling heart of the ancient fairy tales and psychologically stirring mythologies that feed them.

It is bold from the start, with American Dadaist/Surrealist Man Ray's image of a girl suspended in a sea of rose petals emblazoned across the front-cloth. A neat overture tells us The King (Jarkko Lehmus) and The Queen (a typically foxy Eve Mutso) are desperate for a child by way of a visit to the doctor. En route they run into the Lilac Fairy (played rather blankly by Soon Ja Lee), who disguises herself as mother-with-pram to offer her blessing.

As with Cinderella, Page and McDonald make canny use of the central time-shifts. Sometimes barely acknowledged, the symbolic 100-year sleep at the heart of the story is taken literally. We begin in 1830 at Aurora's christening in an idyllic sun-dappled palace garden somewhere in Russia, with the King and Queen's extended European family in attendance. When Carabosse and her deliciously ghastly crew gatecrash, trashing the doctor's bag Pete Doherty-style for pills and potions, we feel the distant rumbles of conflict and revolt.

Fast-forward to 1946 and Aurora has slept through two world wars and the Russian Revolution. Choreographer and designer go to town - swapping peachy frothy frocks, showcase tulle skirts and pretty steps of the prologue and act one for the sharp, confident lines and nipped-in waists of Christian Dior's New Look in act three. When this Beauty marries her prince it is in a Ritz-type London hotel where these dispossessed royals are selling off their jewellery. Not for this creative duo the usual faceless fairytale aristos of the ballet world. This lot have to justify their place in history.

Even the act three divertissements now have some roots. In traditional versions they appear from nowhere as typically 19th century Russian padding to the weak narrative. Page has worked his into a kind of Sondheim "into the woods" scenario where fairytale characters like Red Riding Hood and Snow White wander the enchanted forest in search of true love. When they appear later as wedding party guests who let rip, incorporating Tango, Hollywood musicals and sharp-edged modern for some of the best dancing of the night, it all makes sense.

At times - especially where Page tries to retain an air of pretty-pretty classicism - the dance is the weakest link. But as storyteller, he triumphs. He and McDonald are forging a formidable double-act with these gutsy spins on the prize baubles from the classical canon. And if the dance sags at points, we are in thrall and thoroughly entertained by a ballet famous for its glaring lack of plot.

Sleeping Beauty is one of the "biggies" of the traditional repertoire: a three-act summation of classical ideals that Page himself refers to it as the Ring Cycle of the dance world. With its perfect collaboration between music and dance and notoriously tricky choreographic set pieces like Petipa's "Rose Adagio", it was made famous in the UK when Margot Fonteyn danced Aurora in the post-war staging that re-opened the home of Royal Ballet in London's Covent Garden.

As a former Royal Ballet dancer, Page has this heritage in his veins. Perhaps wisely, given his archly modern ballet style and the company's comparative smallness, he has ditched most of the Petipa bar Aurora's act one entrance and two solos.

But while the story romps along, the choreography feels patchy and some performances lacklustre. Claire Robertson is radiant at times but doesn't dazzle as a prima should. This is a budding Beauty, yet to blossom.shaken awake